OUR VISION -The Rotary Club of Huntsville, Texas is an organization of business, professional, and community leaders recognized for our service above self who come together through commitment and fellowship to create opportunities for a better future for the generations who follow us. OUR MISSION - It is our mission to embrace the ideals of Rotary International by contributing to a better Huntsville and a better world through active service projects promoting high ethical standards while providing our membership extraordinary opportunities for networking, fellowship, friendship and personal growth. AS A PART OF ROTARY INTERNATIONAL -Which is “an organization of business, professional and community leaders who unite world wide to provide humanitarian service to others that includes the improvement of health, support of education and the elimination of poverty through, helping build goodwill and peace in the World.”
SIGNATURE PROJECTS:
The Huntsville Rotary Club was chartered in 1923 and has bettered the lives of Huntsville residents through 1) Adopt A Highway, 2) scholarships, 3) youth leadership camps, 4) year-long foreign exchange experiences for high school students, 5) “I Like Me” book distribution to kindergarteners, 6) Safety Town for elementary school children, 7) two-week foreign exchange for business men and women, 8) opportunities to network with other local leaders in Huntsville, and 9) opportunities to serve globally through polio vaccination trips to the Middle-East and Asia, water-well trips to Nicaragua, and solar-LED lamp distribution in Central America. If you would like to become a part of the great work we are doing, then please contact us at HuntsvilleRotary.org.
1. Adopt a Highway (Park Road 40)
The Rotary Club of Huntsville has adopted Park Road 40, which runs from Huntsville State Park to Highway 75. Each quarter, club members get to visit with each other while they exercise and pick up trash along this beautiful 1.3 mile stretch of highway.
2. Scholarships for Graduating Seniors
Each year the club gives up to three $1000 scholarships in honor of two of our outstanding members – Jack Staggs and M. It is an honor for us to support the bright futures of the graduating seniors. And hopefully, this support will build a bridge to Rotary in the students’ future endeavors.
3. Youth Leadership Camp (Rotary Youth Leadership Awards)
Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA), is Rotary International training program for young leaders, to emphasize leadership, citizenship, and personal growth. Each year, thousands of young people participate in this program. Young people ages 14–30 are sponsored by Rotary Clubs to attend the event run by the club's district committee. Participants are chosen for their leadership potential. Rotary Clubs and the Rotary District cover all expenses for the participants. The District 5910 event is held at Pineywoods Baptist Encampment, Woodlake, Texas, where the participants discuss leadership skills and to learn those skills through practice.
4. Rotary Youth Exchange
Youth Exchange is a study-abroad opportunity for young people who spend anywhere from a few weeks to a full year as an international student hosted by local Rotary clubs. Exchanges are for people ages 15–19 who have demonstrated leadership in their school and community, are flexible and willing to try new things, are open to cultural differences, and can serve as an ambassador for their own country. Local Rotary clubs generously host students and provide room and board with a host family and a small monthly stipend. Participants are generally responsible for round-trip airfare, insurance, travel documents (such as passports and visas), and spending money for additional travel and tour fees.
5. “I Like Me” book distribution
Literacy and reading proficiency are critical to a young child's success. Teaching a child to value books is an important step in the process of teaching them to value reading. Unfortunately, students and parents in Huntsville struggle financially. According to texastribune.org, 60.2% of HISD students are classified as economically disadvantaged and 45.8% fit into the “at risk” category. It is quite possible that young children in these homes do not have a single book to call their own. The “I Like Me” book program addresses this need. In this program, every kindergartener gets a book published especially for them. Each book has the child’s name, the name of a friend, and the teacher’s name as a part of the text. This turns the book itself into a valuable possession, and turns the task of reading into an adventure to see how their name is used in the text.
6. Safety Town
The Club has built a small-scale Safety Town to teach essential safety skills to elementary school children. They learn about safe and unsafe ways to cross streets, traffic safety using tricycles, and fire safety from Huntsville Fire Department volunteers. They also meet role models in action through our high school Rotaract Volunteers. The club has an ongoing role in maintaining Safety Town, and our partnership with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice keeps the streets swept and the grass mowed.
7. Group Study Exchange
Group Study Exchange is an educational program of The Rotary Foundation wherein Rotary districts in different countries are paired to send and receive professional study groups of non-Rotarian team members and one Rotarian team leader to travel for four to six weeks, staying in the homes of Rotarians when possible. The Group Study Exchange program is a unique cultural and vocational exchange opportunity for young business and professional men and women in their initial years of professional life. The program is designed to develop professional and leadership skills among young adults so that they can address the needs of their communities and an increasingly global workplace. GSE offers Rotarians the opportunity to participate in sending, receiving, and sharing educational experiences of study teams that will enhance Rotary’s worldwide mission.
8. Leadership in Huntsville
OUR VISION: The Rotary Club of Huntsville, Texas is an organization of business, professional, and community leaders recognized for our service above self. We come together through fellowship and a commitment to create opportunities for a better future for the generations who follow us. OUR MISSION: It is our mission to embrace the ideals of Rotary International by contributing to a better Huntsville and a better world. We actively promote high ethical standards, create a better community through service, and provide our membership extraordinary opportunities for networking, fellowship, friendship, and personal growth. OUR COMMON CAUSE - ROTARY INTERNATIONAL: Which is “an organization of business, professional, and community leaders who unite worldwide to provide humanitarian service to others that includes the improvement of health, support of education, and the elimination of poverty through, helping build goodwill and peace in the World.”
9. Opportunities to serve globally through polio vaccination trips to the Middle-East and Asia, water-well trips to Nicaragua, and solar-LED lamp distribution in Central America. Over the past ten years we have raised approximately $100,000 and used those funds to drill approximately 50 water wells in remote villages in Nicaragua in cooperation with the Rotary Club of Tulsa, OK, and the Rotary Club in Leòn, Nicragua. Clean water opens so many doors in these remote communities. Young children can get an education rather than hiking long distances to retrieve water and surface-water-borne diseases can be avoided. The club has also begun supporting Grid Earth – a non-profit that produces and distributes solar-powered LED lanterns. With our support, Grid Earth outfitted a whole village in Belize with solar lamps, which allows the families to avoid the black lung and fire risks of using kerosene lanterns indoors. There are opportunities for club members to travel to remote locations to serve face-to-face.
